Toronto Star Classroom Connection

French connection

Delphine Courteille, hair stylist to women famous for their effortless chic, invited me to her Paris salon — and gave me a life-changing cut

KATHERINE LALANCETTE

Michelangelo was once asked how he’d sculpt an elephant. He replied, “I would take a large piece of stone and take away everything that was not the elephant.” Well that’s what Delphine Courteille did to my hair: She took away everything that wasn’t French and revealed the Rive Gauche dweller who was apparently hiding inside my mane all along.

Back in 2019, I interviewed Courteille for a story I was writing about the secrets of French woman hair. “Everything starts with the cut,” she’d declared, inviting me to sit in her chair and see for myself the next time I’d be in Paris. Three years and a pandemic later, I finally took her up on her offer.

A few steps from the Tuileries Gardens, Courteille’s salon is tucked away in a courtyard concealed by an imposing iron gate on rue du Mont Thabor. You need a code to get in, which seems fitting considering the many famous names in her client book: French style stars like Inès de la Fressange, Jeanne Damas and Sophie Fontanel, as well as international clients who call on her expertise when they’re in town: Alexa Chung, Karlie Kloss, Rashida Jones … The day before my appointment, Courteille shares a snap of Pharrell Williams getting his colour touched up.

I punch the code on the keypad and feel a rush as the heavy door opens, as though I’ve entered some inner sanctum of hair. The salon is gorgeous: pale peach walls, terrazzo floors and loads of curved lives and brass details. It’s soft and serene and a wee bit whimsical — worlds away from the thumping beats and black vinyl seats that dominate the salon scene back home.

Courteille is as warm and inviting as her space, all smiles and piece-y strands casually raked to one side. She directs me to her chair. “Ditesmoi.” (Tell me.) I explain I’d like to keep my hair longish but maybe have it be a bit more face-framing. She nods intently, running her finger through my lengths. “Levezvous s’il vous plaît.” (Stand up, please.) She hands me a black robe to slip on and before I know it: snip, snip, snip. Her scissors are at work before I’ve even sat back down, chunks of hair flying all around me. I’d prepared a whole folder of inspo shots to show her on my phone, but to hell with that, I guess. I can feel my blood pressure rising.

“I always cut hair when it’s dry,” she tells me, apparently sensing my surprise. “It gives me a better feel for the hair. When it’s wet, it’s heavier, and you can’t really see what’s going on.” I settle back in her chair and she grabs more pieces, snipping into them vertically. It’s a technique called piquetage, a.k.a. point cutting, which she favours for its a create soft edges. Layers blend together more seamlessly, bulk is removed without overly thinning the hair.

She has me rise and sit a bunch more times, giving the whole process the reverence of a Catholic mass. Not once does she reach for a clip or section off my hair in any way. She cuts a little here and there, focuses on the front, then the back, then the front again. “I work on the entire head at once,” she says. The holistic-ness of her method doesn’t stop there. On a client’s first visit, she offers a consultation and recherche de style — a style search. (It’ll set you back 250 euros.) “I look at their face shape and profile, their facial expressions, the way they carry themselves, what they’re wearing — that’s why I like to wait before having clients put on a robe. I’ll ask them how often they wash their hair, how they care for it and dry it. Every cut is 100 per cent custom.”

I’m starting to feel better as she explains all this until I notice the strands on either side of my face now end in the middle of my cheek. It occurs to me that I’ve neglected to mention my blown-out hair is naturally quite wavy. I imagine two Shirley Temple corkscrews forming at the first sight of water …

She sends me to the back bar for a wash with her eponymous shampoo and conditioner (they smell like a Ladurée counter — terribly chic and a little sweet), and I return to her station for a few final tweaks. “The mark of a good haircut is when you don’t have to make a lot of effort to style it — it should just fall into place on its own.”

I soon see exactly what she means. With every snip, my hair seems to swing into position, as though it’s been released from shackles and is now free to do what it’s always wanted to. Those shorter pieces in the front? They’re suddenly channelling vintage Brigitte Bardot (or current Matilda Djerf) and swooping alongside my temples without the slightest hint of styling. The woman is the Michelangelo of hair, I tell you.

After a quick blowout with a round brush, I find myself back on the streets of Paris with a little bag of Delphine Courteille products in tow. It’s a warm October afternoon, cerulean skies and golden trees. I decide to take my new French woman hair for a spin in the Tuileries Gardens. “Vous êtes très jolie, mademoiselle,” a silver-haired gentleman tells me. I certainly feel très jolie. Revelling in my new-hair high, I make a beeline for famed clothing store Sézane, deciding the perfect Parisian cut deserves the perfect Parisian knit. Then I decree a French bra (Princess TamTam) and a French lipstick (Rouje) are also in order, and before I know it, my inner Gallic elephant has stretched beyond my hair and manifested itself across my entire being. Courteille was right: Everything starts with the cut.

LIVING |

en-ca

2022-11-26T08:00:00.0000000Z

2022-11-26T08:00:00.0000000Z

https://torontostarnie.pressreader.com/article/283566634531940

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